Sigma Chi International Fraternity Closes Stanford Chapter

News Release—For Immediate Release

Friday, May 11, 2018

Evanston, Illinois

The International Fraternity’s Executive Committee (EC) has voted to close its undergraduate chapter at Stanford University due to risk management concerns and accountability issues within the chapter. The decision follows a membership assessment, through which International Fraternity leaders determined there were few members who would carry the chapter forward in a positive manner.

The initiated chapter members will now be on suspended active status, meaning they will be recognized as initiates, but they are prohibited from engaging in anything that could be conceived of as a Sigma Chi activity until 2021. Pledges are without commitment to Sigma Chi and are free to affiliate with other campus fraternities.

The International Fraternity hopes to one day return to campus, with the support of Stanford University administrators. Sigma Chi will partner with Stanford to ensure that the timing is right for a return and that the environment would be a positive one in which to build a chapter of future leaders.

“It is always a difficult decision to close a chapter, but we do so to retain the integrity of the organization,” says 70th Grand Consul (international president) Tommy Geddings, SOUTH CAROLINA 1985. “We would rather close a chapter with the promise of one day returning to campus than to risk our reputation and soil the White Cross, or Fraternity badge.”

Sigma Chi is one of the largest collegiate fraternities with undergraduate chapters at 240 universities and colleges and more than 250,000 alumni members. Sigma Chi provides a welcoming environment for young men of different temperaments, talents and convictions to enjoy a unique lifelong bond that extends far beyond college. Through world-class leadership training, extensive mentoring programs, and a strong focus on academic achievement, Sigma Chi sets itself apart as the preeminent collegiate leadership development organization, challenging its members to live by its core values and exemplify character-in-action™ in every aspect of their lives, and the lives of others.